The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1887-01-28
GROWING OLD.

One aspect OF the beauty Of old age,
says an English writer, is intensely
striking and deeply interesting to the
mind Of the thoughtful observer. What
likeness there Is to each other In those
persons who have passed q goodly num-
Der Of years together in continual and
friendly companionship. Take the case
Of husband and wife as, perhaps. the
most significant instance of this. They
have fought shoulder to shoulder the
battle Of life together; hand in hand
and heart to heart they have made COM
mon cause OF the sorrows and joys OF
life. They have lived as
Two souls with but one single thought,
As the Scripture phrases 1t, they have
grown aged together The result of
such sympathetic conipanionship is
very apparent, indeed, for they are very
often found to have become most sim
gularly alike in the pitch and tone of
their voices, in their ways of thinking
and acting, and not seldom even in per-
sonal appearance Having passed to-
gether through what Washington Irv-
ing called the '.fiery trials of this
world" they have come forth as the
same purified gold. Like two pebbles
in the brook, or on the beach by the
sea, exposed to the same influences, they
have become the second self of each
other, and have been shaped into the
same image.
Under such trying and developing
circumstances it Is not much a matter
of wonder that the age should have
grown beautiful, or that in companion
ship they should have grown beautiful
ogether. The natural wonder would
be If it were otherwise, after what
Moore termed
That happy minglement of hearts,
in which the affection of the one an
swers to the love of the other, and wien
the consequent action and reaction has
done its work. Indeed, when the two
lives have gone on together harmonious
ly for three-fourths of lifetime 1t is to
be expected that the result of the inter-
course should be veriication of the
affirmation of the son of Siruch, that,
''as the clear light is upon the holy
candlestick, so is the beauty of the face
in ripe age;" and that there should also
be, as Wordsworth put the thought in
his "Lines to young LADY,
An old age serene and bright,
And lovely as Lapland night.
OF course, the truth of this conten-
ton, that old age is naturally beautiful,
is not universally acknowledged. Nine
de Stael, for instance, who was called
by the poet Heine, ''sultana of minds
and So whirlwind in petticoats," once
said, in an apparently rueful way, ut
is difficult to grow old gracefully"
Doubtless there is some truth in the
statement, but it is only accurate to say
so when there are no inward graces of
the heart and mind. Inward poverty
makes outward meanness; and old age
is then like an unsheltered tree, stripped
of its leaves, and even of its branches,
and left to fall before the pitiless blasts
of life's wintry wind. If there are.
however, the true inward graces in pos
session, old age is even more compla-
cent and luxurious than youth, and the
growing years give an aspect of ever in
creasing and glowing handsomeness.
The years sit with harmonious becom-
ingness upon the face, and the counte-
nance keeps loving company with that
glory of man or woman-the silvery
locks
But, Nine. de Stael nothwithstand-
ing. there are many persons who have
attained to good old age with grace
fulness; who have attained to what DR..
johnson exquisitely describes as
An age that melts in unperceived decay,
And glides in modest innocence away.
And when the inevitable end draws
near for them, with TRANQUIL endowment
in the heart with maturity of knowl-
edge in the mind, and with a peaceful
onward-looking Of the soul. they fall
into the loving arms of the future,
Like mellow fruit without winter storm.